The Parkland High School baseball team has had a great month of May.

The Trojans won the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference championship by defeating Liberty 7-5 in eight innings in the final on May 17.

Parkland then met the Hurricanes again in the District 11 championship game last Thursday night at DeSales University’s Weiland Park and once again came out on top, winning 1-0 for their first district gold since 2015.

It felt like a long time coming for the Trojans (20-5 overall), who won their eighth district title in program history. But it was a struggle getting over the top of late, finishing runner-up in each of the last two years to Liberty.

Senior Connor Gerhart scored the game’s lone run after he led off the bottom of the first inning with a single and then advanced to third base after both Brady Derr and Will Dobil reached safely.

A ground-ball double play allowed Gerhart to cross home and that run stuck as junior starting pitcher Sawyer Marsteller threw six shutout innings, allowing just four hits while striking out one, and senior Steven Sepko recorded the save with a scoreless seventh.

“This feels great,” said Gerhart. “Obviously, we were in the same spot last year. We knew how it felt to be over there and hold the silver medals. To hold the gold ones and hold the trophy, it’s amazing. This is what we worked all year for since January. It’s a great feeling.”

It was Parkland’s third one-run win as it pulled out its first two district playoff wins by 2-1 scores.

Marsteller has had different roles during the season, being a starter some games and a reliever in others. When his name was called to take the ball to start in the biggest game of his career, he didn’t remained his confident self because not only is his stuff good, but the defense behind him is special as well.

“I have a lot of confidence because I trust my defense a lot,” said Marsteller. “That just helps. The defense made every single play imaginable. I could just throw whatever I had to, and I knew the defense would make a play.”

The Trojan defense helped out the pitchers in a number of different ways and made some dazzling plays, but just as important, did not commit and error.

After giving up a leadoff hit in the top of the seventh inning, Sepko registered the final three outs via a sacrifice bunt, a fly out to center and a pop out to second base.

Gerhart finished with two hits in two at-bats. Nathan Unger also went 2-for-2 at the plate. Derr, Dobil and Jack Streeter all recorded a hit.

Parkland will now advance to the PIAA State Tournament and host Neshaminy, the District 1 fourth-place team on Monday.